This invention relates generally to antennas, and more particularly, to slot array antennas.
In the past slot array antennas have generally been designed by using certain design conventions. These conventions included spacing the slots at equal distances and terminating the antenna in either a shorted termination or in the characteristic impedance of the waveguide. However these conventions have several inherent undesirable effects. For example, the phase at each slot is only approximated, the input impedance of the array is generally uncontrolled and therefore usually does not match the impedance of the source, the pattern shapes obtainable from these slot array antennas is limited, and finally, in the case of nonresonant slot array antennas, the antenna must have a large number of slots in order to approximate an impedance match with a generating source.
Therefore, it can be appreciated that a slot array antenna which provides substantially complete control of the phase and amplitude at each slot, provides a match to the generating source, and can be of relatively short length is highly desirable.